Edwards, T. Elbert

Posted November 16th, 2011 by Linda Horton

DALLAS BOY IN THE NAVY.

T. Elbert Edwards Writes of Incidents on Shipboard and Abroad.

T. Elbert Edwards, a Dallas boy, in the United States navy, in a letter dated Portland, England, Dec. 18, to his parents, Mr. and Mrs. T. A. Edwards. Station A. R. F. D. No. 8 Dallas County, describes his voyage across the Atlantic and a visit to Paris, France. Of the trouble in the Harbor of Cherbourg, he says: "At the time was there any trouble between the Bluejackets and the French sailors, of which we have read such lurid accounts in the American newspapers. It is true that one of our men stabbed and killed one of his shipmates and wounded a man from the Kansas, but it was a personal affair, and there was no outsider concerned."

Describing an incident of his visit to Paris, he says: "At the tomb of Napoleon in the Church of the Invalides, I had the pleasure of shaking hands with one of the Napoleon 111's veterans as he stood guard at the entrance of the crypt, the most imposing and impressive edifice I ever expect to see. The old warrior were the badge of the Legion of Honor, the Crimean War medal, and a medal presented by the King of Spain."

Speaking of the passage across the Atlantic, he says: "We received the news from all over the world each day, not in the form of newspapers, but plucked down from the skies and posted, typewritten, for the benefit of the crew. In midocean we knew, as soon as did the New York newspaper readers, what the Democrats did and what the Republicans didn't in the election."

The principal diversions at sea consist of reading, cards, checkers, boxing, concerts by the ship's orchestra and band, and an occasional free-for-all fight among the mascots of the ship--the bear, the goat and the dog.